Enron’s Ken Lay and Jeffrey Skilling were both found guilty today on multiple counts of fraud and conspiracy. What a pity. Since this is ostensibly a political blog, I guess it’s worth bringing up the political angle here—via Digby—namely, Lay’s close ties with the president:
[T]he reality, as established by a wealth of historical record and recent disclosures, is that Lay and Enron were instrumental in Bush’s rise to power – and Bush played an important behind-the-scenes role in advancing Enron’s aggressive deregulation agenda, which helped the energy trader ascend to its lofty perch as the seventh-biggest U.S. company.
The Bush-Lay coziness earned the Enron chief a nickname from Bush as “Kenny Boy.” But more importantly for Enron, Bush pitched in as governor and president whenever the energy trader wanted easier regulations within the U.S. or to have U.S. taxpayers foot the bill for loan guarantees or risk insurance for Enron’s overseas ventures.
But for some reason, major media outlets were never much interested in this story. Can’t imagine why it didn’t get David Broder all hot and bothered…
